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Hi,
just wont to no what plants people use for a carpet affect in there tank, ie riccia, hair grass, stagmia, how do people keep riccia in the gravel and give it that carpet affect
cheers axl

There are many types of "carpet" plants. Some easy some not so easy. Most require very strong light, but a few don't.

At the moment I've built a small carpet area in my large tank (I'll be posting some new pics soon, just waiting for a couple of plants to grow in - almost there).

I'm using Microsword, not sure what variety (there's a few and they are difficult to tell apart), I think it's "Mauritius". So far it's been very easy, it's spreading but quite slowly. I cheated a little and planted it heavily. Been in a few weeks and still very healthy and bright green and slowly spreading out. It's interspersed with a mixture of Tenellus and Cryptocorene Parva.This is under 2.2 wpg and high Co2 levels.

Of the ones I've tried in the past, Tenellus and Dwarf Sag seem to be very easy.

Riccia. You cant actually keep it in the gravel, it's a floating plant - a very floating plant. You'll find anybody who keeps it as a carpet as some keep of contrapion holding it down and very strong masochistic tendencies they really ought to be receiving therapy for ! It's the biggest pain in the butt ever.
To form a carpet some people create sheets of mesh in which the Riccia is sandwiched between and placed oon top of the gravel. It can be tied to wood or rock or held down with a hairnet. Either way no matter what you do it will be constantly trying to float away and will invariably succeed.

I relented recently when I had an opportunity to buy some in very good condition and very cheaply. I attached it to a large flat rock and held it down with a hairnet.It was very beautiful and really looked good in tank ....... for all of 2 days]:|
It is very easy to grow, but indredibly hard to keep in place. Apart from it's floating tendency, the fish loved the stuff. The female Boesmanni's would rip it apart for fun They pull out clumps and chase the clump around the tank, get tired of that and go back for another clump. The Rams ate it like starving refugees. The SAE was constantly head down up in the stuff quivering like a lunatic. Within a few days most of it was floating and the rock was full of bald patches. I'd put it back in place, but a few days later it would be the same. After a couple of weeks I finally gave up on it. Most of it went in the bin. I did keep a big portion as a floater and it's actually very pretty and easy to keep that way. The individual pieces floating are like magenets They seem to find one another and form a big floating ball,and seems to stay quite still and neat. it produces O2 bubbles like crazy and is like a bunch of twinkling stars floating across the top of the tank. Gouramies and Pencilfish love it this way.

As a carpet I'd say forget it, beautiful, but not enough to justify the effort and is a definate danger to your mental health.

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...and there's also the Glossostigma elantoinoides which is easier than riccia (I guess, never tried riccia, I think all that work of keeping it down is not for me). It needs very strong lights or else it will grow up instead of forming a carpet. The first few weeks are a pain as it takes a while until it actually gets a hold in the substrate and until then it tries to float, so you have to keep pushing it down into the gravel. I found out that taking a clump of glosso and sticking most of it under the gravel while keeping only a few leaves on top of it works well. If your lights are strong enough and you have co2 and you place clumps of the glosso in strategic positions in the gravel, then it grows quite fast to make a carpet. Then, of course, once it has grown you face the problem of how to trim this thing. Don't ask me, I still haven't got a clue!

I've tried a few carpet plants; hair grass, microsword(twice), and the chain sword echinodorus tenellus, as bensaf mentioned above. The tenellus is the only one I've had any success with. I started with about six of the tenellus in my tank a few months ago, and now there seem to be about a hundred. It's a really fast grower IME, and only needs medium lighting.

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